Millions of Robert Jordan fans will rejoice at the release of the ninth book in the phenomenally best-selling series The Wheel of Time. The sequel to the number-one New York Times best seller The Path of Daggers, which swept the nation like a firestorm, Winter's Heart continues a remarkable tale that is mesmerizing an entire generation of readers.

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Millions of Robert Jordan fans will rejoice at the release of the ninth book in the phenomenally best-selling series The Wheel of Time. The sequel to the number-one New York Times best seller The Path of Daggers, which swept the nation like a firestorm, Winter's Heart continues a remarkable tale that is mesmerizing an entire generation of readers.

Rand is on the run with Min, and in Cairhein, Cadsuane is trying to figure out where he is headed. Rand's destination is, in fact, one she has never considered. Mazrim Taim, leader of the Black Tower, is revealed to be a liar. But what is he up to? Faile, with the Aiel Maidens, Bain and Chiad, and her companions, Queen Alliandre and Morgase, is prisoner of Savanna's sept.Perrin is desperately searching for Faile. With Elyas Machera, Berelain, the Prophet and a very mixed "army" of disparate forces, he is moving through country rife with bandits and roving Seanchan.

The Forsaken are ever more present, and united, and the man called Slayer stalks Tel'aran'rhiod and the wolfdream. In Ebou Dar, the Seanchan princess known as Daughter of the Nine Moons arrives - and Mat, who had been recuperating in the Tarasin Palace, is introduced to her. Will the marriage that has been foretold come about? There are neither beginnings or endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time. But it is a beginning....

This is the worst quality of the Wheel of Time audio books I have encountered. The narrators are understandable, but significantly less audio quality than previous book. This was done by McMillan Publishers and cheaply. Audio Renaissance was much better. Now I understand the message in the beginning of the previous book about using the same narrators for continuity. Notable drop in quality from that book. The parts have 90 chapters about 6-7 minutes long. There is an audible and annoying pause between them. you can also hear what must be the spacing between CDs as words are repeated.

If you read the first 8, does it really matter that this is really a bridge book? You will listen to it and then the next. Perhaps it was a little slow and lacking in action, but it really did move the story forward to the next book and connected a lot of dots. Kate and Michael were amazing per usual on the voice acting side. Whoever edited this, and whoever approved the edit should both go back to flipping burgers. It is almost comical how horribly this is edited. Constant repeat sections, and overlong pauses where there should be none. Crazy!

This was the worst audio book I have ever listened to. There are long pauses as a result of poor editing that make you think story ones are changing but there is no change. Inversely when there should be a pause indicating a switch the editor leaves no gap so several paragraphs later you realize you have switched characters or storylines. Very confusing.

Big chunks of text are repeated. Audio levels vary widely. The editor was asleep on this one. The publisher should give this free until they fix it

I am surprised that there are complaints about the recording / editing of this book going back to May of 2011 yet Audible has not fixed the problem.

I am plowing my way through this wonderful series of books by the late Robert Jordan. I got hooked in the first book and cannot stop. According to Wikipedia, there are 419 hours and 30 minutes of performance by Kate Reading and Micheal Kramer with one more book yet to come.

My reason however for posting this review is because the recording was simply done incorrectly. Many times throughout the performance, you will have to listen to repeated sentences.. Extremely annoying and something that should be easily fixed.

So why hasn't Audible remeded this problem or at least provided a warning to their customers that this version has material defects?

I can't believe I'm doing this... I've made it through the first nine books and 2/3 of the way through the tenth, and I have to put it down... I've tried and tried to come back to it, but gone are the trollocs and myrddraal, and the good page-turning adventure from the start of the series (The "Great Hunt" is one of my all-time favorite books), to be replaced by incessant political "game of houses" suspicions/mistrust; the "gilded, jeweled, highly polished mother-of-pearl enameled matching serving tray and goblets filled with steaming effervescent rose petal-scented spiced wine" (take a breath); and "high neck, gold embroidered pleated riding dresses with lace 'spilling' from the sleeves". Way too over-explained in the detail department! No need to explain the full dress of every single character in the room. And, on the note of characters... There are WAY too many of them, and too many of those have too similar names (trying to discern between/remember the 300+ Aes Sedai he's introduced is becoming a real chore... "Wait, who was she again? Is she the little plump brown ajah that I haven't read about since book five? Or, was it book seven?"). Too many long-winded, overly detailed, full-page explanations of irrelevant things... Primarily, characters that have absolutely no bearing on the story (Really, that much content to explain a serving maid?) I get it... He's trying to set the stage/environment for the reader, but there's a limit to the amount of detail necessary. And, then there's the gender dynamic: Every woman is spiteful towards men, and every man is a dullard where women are concerned... Mr. Jordan was definitely letting his real-life experience show through in his writing, and way too often (in my opinion, anyway).

On the positive side, the reading is performed well. Well, except for maybe the male reader's incessant need to sigh at the end of the majority of the sentences -- I guess for emphasis. Creeped me out a little. But, that's a minor thing and both readers performed well.

And, like everyone else has been saying in these reviews... HORRIBLE editing. Content read and then repeated several times throughout. Definitely emphasized by the overly detailed, unnecessary content.

I will probably try to come back to it again, because I have a lot invested in the series -- and at one point in time I really enjoyed it. Not to mention, I want to see it all come to a conclusion... I guess I just wish Jordan had done it in, maybe six or seven books, instead of 13.

The editing is horrible. The readers are still good but the editing is horrible. The editing is horrible. If me repeating myself is annoying, be prepared to be very annoyed by this book. At first I thought my phone was shorting out and the pause and replay button were somehow being pressed. Either the editor was asleep or just didn't bother to do their job. The previous books in the series didn't suffer from the same problem and hopefully the rest won't. This book needs to be rereleased after it is corrected.

I love this book. I love this series. Mostly I like the 2 narrators; the format is great, but through the series they will often mispronounce names for many books and then change to the right name, and it can be confusing.

Anyway, I give this book 5 stars for the story, but the editing was all messed up. Over and over again chunks of the story will just loop back to repeat again. It's really irritating. That being said, I'd still 100% recommend the book - I just really hope at some point they fix the editing. It's a popular enough series that I think it's worth doing.

I was surprised at the number of times lines were repeated and the long pauses between sections (too numerous to count). And these pauses weren't at the end of the chapter. Was this to lengthen the time of the recording?

Am loving the series - despite starting to lose track of all the characters (there seem to be new ones added each novel) and becoming slightly bored with the use of the word "woolhead". Unfortunately this recording is not so good - there are numerous occassions where lines are repeated and although one accepts the odd error, there are just too many in this book. One wonders why in this digital age they can't simply edit it out? Audible?

4 of 4 people found this review helpful

a

Bath, United Kingdom

12/26/12

Overall

"Excellent, a compelling and addictive epic."

This is one of the best fantasy epics ever written, a series right up there with the work of J. R. R. Tolkien but be warned it is not one to be taken up lightly, this series is Huge!

The books have been kept together so one audio book will get you one book and many hours of happy listening.

Sadly Robert Jordan died in 2007 after publishing book 11, but with the help of Jordan’s wife/editor Harriet McDougal, Brandon Sanderson has taken up the torch, using Jordan’s plentiful notes he is finishing off the series brilliantly, with book 14 being the final volume.

The series is voiced by Michael Kramer and Kate Reading throughout and their performances are exemplary, their narration brings the world to life in a way that simply reading it never had for me, they bring a unique voice and feeling to each of the characters that brings them to life and firmly embeds them in your heart.

The only negative I have to put in is that the audiobooks chapter division bears no relation to where the chapters start and end in the books making the chapter search and snooze modes on the app all but useless.

All in all a five star read. An absolute must for any fantasy epic fan.

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

Isabel

Portsmouth, United Kingdom

7/25/13

Overall

Performance

Story

"Good story but one issue"

Any additional comments?

The recording had a couple of parts where the lines would repeat, not the worst but a little annoying

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Frantisek

Wallingford, United Kingdom

3/1/13

Overall

"Average"

Done it! Listened while working through the whole 14 books. Not bad - not brilliant either. Too much describing of what are people wearing, limited dictionary of dialogues and male-female relationships/interactions painfully similar, predictable -boring (Mr Freud would find it certainly interesting though :)

Maybe because English isn't my first language, maybe I'm spoiled by other writers or maybe Robert Jordan just isn't my type of author but haven't I been working at the time of listening I would considered it time wasted.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

robert

clacton on sea, United Kingdom

2/10/15

Overall

Performance

Story

"poorly edited"

Who might you have cast as narrator instead of Kate Reading and Michael Kramer ?

Kate reading and Michael Kramer are a perfect combination and I am not able to see how it could have been narrated better

Any additional comments?

there are numerous miss edits where sentences are repeated I know others have pointed this out but I didn't realize how bad it was , if it had been a half a dozen times during the course of the narration I would have dismissed it but I lost count beyond 20 but it went way beyond that and after about a dozen times it became a real irritant and took me out of the story every time, thank goodness this is the only book like that, but if you have bought into the story so far its too late to turn back now and the story line and narration itself is just as good as the other 8 books I've listened too

0 of 0 people found this review helpful

Debbie

Upton, United Kingdom

12/1/13

Overall

Performance

Story

"Brilliant, enjoyable story"

If you could sum up Winter's Heart in three words, what would they be?

Brilliant, fantastic story. I am really enjoying the series. A good adventure but with a lot of humour as well, in spite of the dire times. Pity we cannot do our own 'travelling', would save a lot of traffic problems. Just a shame about Robert Jordan and that he wasn't around for the end of the series.

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